Tennis

Once at an NRL match, Wests Tigers fullback Tim Brasher hurled a small novelty footy my way. Pretty sure the thing was intended for his nephew or cousin, but I snatched it, I took it home and that was that.

Leaving aside the fact that a Sydney rugby league fan actually got off his backside and went to a game, there is nothing remarkable about this anecdote. Finders, keepers. Especially at sporting venues.

Yet public sympathy today appears to be leaning heavily towards 14 year old obsessive Novak Djokovic fan Melissa Cook, who missed out on a shirt thrown her way. And public fury is being unleashed on the fan who snatched the shirt.

Continue reading "Other stuff to be angry about today (with video)" »

In the moments after Novak Djokovic crumpled to the ground, fists clenched and screaming to no one in particular, my first thought was that this was the greatest tennis match in history. I wasn’t alone.

But my thoughts quickly turned to why the women’s game doesn’t produce epics like that. This is not to say that the women’s tennis is of poorer quality, or can’t produce incredible matches. It’s doesn’t mean women are weaker and can’t play gripping tennis. The best female tennis players in the world train just as hard and are as dedicated to their sport as any men. But their matches just don’t last as long.

Kim Clijsters’ three set win over Li Na in the fourth round was one of the best games of the last year. The shot-making and tension rivalled almost any match in the men’s draw. Yet as tightly contested as that match was, it still lasted only two hours and 23 minutes. The first two sets of the men’s final alone went for longer.

Continue reading "A fair day’s pay for a fair day’s play" »

There was a famous moment in golf journalism, after an ageing and written-off Jack Nicklaus won the 1986 Masters tournament. A senior writer totally seized up in the media room, clutching his hair and saying “it’s too big, it’s too big, it’s too big…”. What the guy had just witnessed simply defied any words he could write.

You feel the same way trying to describe an Australian Open final like the one we had last night. What do you write? How do you sum up five hours and 53 minutes of the most epic tennis imaginable between two guys with the stamina of marathon runners, the dynamism of sprinters and the skill of marksmen?

Oh, there are all sorts of angles you can take. More angles than a protractor factory. You can take the broad view and start the “who’s the greatest ever?” debate. After all, if Federer has the most Grand Slams ever, but Nadal keeps beating Federer when they meet in Slams, and now Djokovic keeps beating both of them, that’s the kind of argument that could rage on well past pub closing time.

Continue reading "Match of the century!" »

Morning, Punchers. Ant Sharwood here. Last Friday, journalist Amanada Shalala made a fair point on the TV show The Drum. As the panel previewed the Australian Open women’s tennis final, she asked why they were only talking about the grunting.

Should they have talked more about the actual tennis? Was it somehow sexist or gruntist or some such not to do so? And while we’re talking tennis, did anyone catch the men’s final last night? I’m writing this thing at 6:40 pm Sunday night, and I expect Nadal to beat Djokovic in four sets. How’d I go? And what did you make of the final?

What else has got you talking around the water cooler this morning? And hey, why don’t you see as many water coolers as you used to these days?

Margaret Court has been, well, courting controversy these past weeks. The former world no.1 tennis star, turned pastor, has raised the ire of many with a volley of comments labelling homosexuality a sin. Earlier this week the tennis great wrote in The Herald Sun: “Australia is in a steep moral decline”, “especially when it comes to the issue of sexuality”.

Outraged gay rights supporters have returned serve. They’re pushing for the Margaret Court Arena at Melbourne Park to stripped of its name and they’ve been encouraging Australian Open attendees to drape themselves in rainbow in defiance.

The kerfuffle is sure making a racket, but there’s something else at fault here. Since when were places named after people while they were alive anyway? Isn’t the whole point of naming a place after someone to commemorate the life and achievements of a person, you know, after they’ve died?

Continue reading "You’re courting disaster naming places after the living" »

The viewers are sick of it. The commentators are sick of it. The other players are sick of it - to the point where they’re asking the WTA to act, and even worse, taking the piss out of them behind their backs (see below video of Caroline Wozniacki and Kim Clijsters).

Whether it’s cheating or not is open to discussion, but there’s no denying Maria Sharapova and her fellow screaming grunters are driving everyone around the bend.

This afternoon as Sharapova hits Rod Laver Arena for her Australian Open quarter finals match against fellow-Russian Ekaterina Makarova, Seven may as well give the commentators an hour and a half off work. No one will be watching with the sound on.

Continue reading "Maria Sharapova, would you Just. Shut. Up…" »

OK, so having spent half the summer bagging old buggers who don’t know when to quit, let’s give some love to those who continue to ripen on the vine without rotting.

Firstly, Roger Federer. The Swiss master is known as FedEx because he delivers results fast. Last night, the Ex stood for Exhibition, as in exhibition match. There were two tennis players on Rod Laver Arena last night – Federer and Jim Courier, who interviewed him after the game.

Bernard Tomic was apparently also there, but pretty much just as a hitting partner. Oh, he tried. He came with a plan. A plan to blast Federer off the court instead of teasing him with deft touches he’d employed so well against lesser opponents. It was the Malaysia Solution of sporting strategies.

Continue reading "Old dudes who still got it" »

In between promos for Revenge, My Kitchen Rules and Please Marry My Boy, tennis star Marcos Baghdatis had a wee meltdown at the Australian Open on Wednesday and smashed his way through four shiny blue tennis racquets.

Given he scored a pay cheque of $20,000 just for winning round one, the $770 fine meted out to Baghdatis must have made those poor racquets feel positively worthless.

I love the Aussie Open. Like interminable school holidays (“Muuum!” “Muuum!” “Muuum!”) it’s synonymous with summer. But if tempers can fray on the court, imagine how the rest of us feel at home.

Continue reading "The tennis is awesome but I don’t love all" »

“Opinions are like orgasms: mine matters most, and I don’t care if you have one.”

I’m not sure where I first read this, but it seems to typify public debate in Australia, where opposing parties love to discredit an argument by giving it a label: racist, sexist, chauvinist, insensitive, homophobe, ignorant…

In philosophy classes, this type of argument was called an ad hominem, and it’s only reward was an F, but in public debate it’s a timesaver, a cheap political point. Remember when Bill Heffernan questioned Gillard’s leadership because she was “deliberately barren”? Same deal.

Continue reading "The biggest bigots are the buggers who blame bigotry" »

The racquets smashed by Marcos Baghdatis in last night’s Australian Open outburst have spoken out exclusively about the pain, the hurt and the trauma of racquet abuse.

“This sort of thing should never be tolerated,” said a severely twisted and broken T-Flash 315 Speedflex who preferred to remain anonymous.

“I don’t care if you’re at the Australian Open, Wimbledon or the Kazakhstan Invitational,” the racquet said. “It is simply never acceptable to abuse a racquet in this way.

Continue reading "Racquets have feelings too" »

Despite the quality of Michael Clarke’s record since taking over the Test captaincy, he’d been much-maligned until his Sydney triple ton. But Clarke’s record-breaking knock has finally silenced the knockers.

The performance was all the more memorable because it happened it was on home soil. Amplified media attention, free-to-air TV coverage, and the ability to attend events live means sport played domestically is afforded extra credence.

Bernard Tomic now finds himself in a similar boat to the former Mr Lara Bingle.

Continue reading "A Tomic bomb ticking all the right boxes" »

What happened
On the 10th anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, you wouldn’t have thought an American would be booed by their own crowd at a major sporting event in New York City. Yet Serena Williams achieved exactly this.

In normal circumstances, the story of the day would have been Sam Stosur’s straight sets US Open victory, which made her the first Ausralian woman in to win a Grand Slam event since Evonne Goolagong Cawley won Wimbledon way back in 1981.

But Williams changed the whole tone of the event with a foul outburst at the umpire. Among other filth she said “You’re out of control” and “You’re a hater, and you’re just unattractive inside.” We just wish the umpire had returned serve with that old schoolyard taunt “I know you are but what am I?”

Continue reading "Biggest moments of 2011 #14 Serena spats, Sam slams" »

When Australia’s universal good guy Pat Rafter makes Lleyton Hewitt look well-mannered, you know the Australian sporting universe has been turned on its head.

Everything went wrong for Australian sport this weekend. Everything. The NZ Warriors knocked Wests Tigers out of the NRL finals, Ireland beat the Wallabies in the Rugby World Cup, Sri Lanka dominated the cricket, and the Davis Cup turned ugly on court and off.

Sheesh, even the early Melbourne Cup favourite is now a Kiwi horse. But let’s talk about the two that really hurt – the Wallabies and Davis Cup.

Continue reading "Woeful Wallabies not on their Pat Malone" »

Talented, graceful Gold Coaster Sam Stosur has won her maiden grand slam title against probably the most ill-tempered so-called sportsperson ever to play any game.

Stosur beat Williams 6-2 6-3 in an incredible display of power tennis, launching blistering forehand after forehand, as Serena Williams resorted to umpire abuse in a vain attempt to disrupt her opponent.

Incredibly, on America’s day of national mourning, the Williams antics backfired and the New York crowd turned against one of its own. The Big Apple knows a bad apple when it sees one.

Continue reading "Slammin’ Sam shows Serena how to act like a lady" »

When you hear the words “father”, “coach” and “talented young tennis player” in the same sentence, it’s usually time to oil the rifle. For now, though, let’s give young Australian tennis star Bernard Tomic the benefit of the doubt.

Overnight, Tomic became the only Australian men’s player other than Lleyton Hewitt to make the Wimbledon quarter finals since 2003 with his demolition of some Belgian dude with an X in his name. He’ll now face world number two Novak Djokovic, whom he beat in an exhibition match in Melbourne last summer.

In serious competition, Djokovic will likely whip Tomic. But as the youngest man in the draw, the Australian’s performances at Wimbledon this year prove beyond doubt that he has now officially arrived, after all the years of hype. So now that he’s here, what can we expect to see?

Continue reading "Bernard Tomic is one seriously talented sonofabic" »

Andy Murray’s second consecutive loss of the men’s Australian Open final has put a question mark on the Scot’s mettle. Does Murray have what it takes to win a grand slam?

Murray was inconsolable at Melbourne Park after Serbian world No. 3 Novak Djokovic blew him away in straight sets 6-4 6-2 6-3 to secure his second Aussie title.

Is Murray suffering psychological damage after losing to the greats in these grand slams?

Continue reading "Another Murray in trouble" »

9.42 pm. Saturday night update. Three match points to Clijsters. Please ignore everything below. This has been a totally engrossing women’s final… unbearable tension. Hang on. Gotta let the cat in. 

So I’m watching an Australian Open mixed doubles battle between four players who are almost as good as suburban A-grade singles players. Then whoosh! Just like that! A pigeon lands on the ledge outside my office window.

And not just any pigeon, but one of those really rare and beautiful grey ones! Awesome! An actual grey pigeon. Wow, what a sight.

But back to the tennis. Things are getting really exciting in a fourth round women’s match between two grunting Russian baseliners when… hang on. Hey, I just noticed we’ve still got our Christmas decorations up at work. Oooh, and what about that gorgeous row of paper dalmation baubles. It must’ve been up six weeks and I swear I just saw it for the first time. Heh-he. Dalmatians.

Continue reading "Gosh, hasn’t the tennis been smashing this year…" »

Rafael Nadal’s shock exit from the Australian Open paves the way for Scot Andy Murray to qualify for another showdown with world No. 1 player Roger Federer.

Murray, who carries the hopes of Great Britain after its lean period of producing class players, lost to Federer in last year’s Melbourne Park final.

Murray is super-hungry for a grand slam. He came close twice – in the 2008 US Open and the 2010 Australian – but suffered defeats to Federer each time.

Continue reading "Will Murray finally get a shot at grand slam glory?" »

Australian tennis is suffering a bad dose of the doldrums. After Lleyton Hewitt crashed out of the Australian Open on Tuesday night, it appeared the Aussies would fall over like flies.

But as we despaired over our poor form in recent Grand Slams, Bernard Tomic and Sam Stosur gave Australian tennis an almighty shot in the arm and boosted the Melbourne Park crowd. It now has something decent to cheer about.

Tomic, who snuck into the Australian Open draw with a lucky wildcard, will turn heads when he takes on world No. 1 Rafael Nadal in the third round.

Continue reading "Stosur! Come on!" »

It was the nail-biter of all nail-biters but no one could have imagined Aussie lionheart Lleyton would surrender two match points before losing to arch rival David Nalbandian in the Australian Open’s first round.

After an epic fight lasting 4hrs 48mins at Melbourne Park last night, Hewitt finally succumbed to the powerful Argentine, who confessed he played “amazing” tennis during the five-set corker.

Hewitt’s failure to secure the win after two match points shows he is not 100 per cent confident in his form.

Continue reading "Lleyton Hewitt’s agony: finally out in the open" »

Lleyton Hewitt craves an Australian Open title like no other Aussie tennis player.

It’s that drive and hunger that has seen Hewitt line up for 15 Australian Open campaigns.

Hewitt has come close to winning the men’s trophy just once. In 2005, Marat Safin whipped the spirited Aussie in four sets in the final.

Continue reading "Lleyton’s passion not enough to challenge tennis greats" »

Something to chew on while we all wait for this tedious election stalemate to sort itself out. It’s about sports people who become politicians, and the way their former sport influences their political leanings.

Here’s the deal. Politicians with a background in individual sports gravitate towards the conservative side. Conversely, politicians who made their name in team sports usually end up on the left.

Makes sense, really. In individual sports, the struggle is yours and yours alone. Fail, and there’s nobody to blame but you. It’s pure, sweaty libertarianism.

Continue reading "Does our sport choose our politics?" »

Update: Sam Stosur last night went through to the French Open final. She could become the first Australian female Grand Slam winner in three decades after her dominating straight sets win over Jelana Jankovic. So all aboard people.

OK folks, there’s a seat for everyone in Australia. All you need is your remote, some jingoism and a beer hat. And make it snappy, because the Socceroos bandwagon is also leaving from the next platform in a matter of days.

I caught the end of the second set last night. Samantha Stosur had won the first 6-2 but lost the second to Serena Williams in a tie-break. At that point Williams was in total control so I called it a night, just as this guy suggested some might do. Too bad, as I would have had some wriggle room for indignation this morning wondering where everybody was when she needed our support from the start of the French Open.

But here we are. Stosur beat the world No.1. Tennis cliches and unimaginative chants at the ready, please. You cannot be serious. Onto that powerful forehand. She needs to dig deep. It was on the line, surely. Sam-an-tha, clap-clap-clap. Sam-an-tha, clap-clap-clap. 

Continue reading "All aboard! The Sam Stosur bandwagon is on its way" »

YOU would be forgiven for thinking you had front row seats at a Paris fashion runway rather than courtside at this year’s French Open.

The tennis couture displayed by the women has left nothing to the imagination and left fans to ask the question ``Why?’’

Has women’s tennis become so boring that the players feel they have to wear provocative costumes or eye catching—and just plain wrong—outfits to get attention?

Continue reading "No butts about it, Venus is in her own orbit" »

It’s the moment Great Britain has been waiting for – one of its own tennis players on the verge of winning a grand slam.

The talented Scot has all the right attributes to win a grand slam. But Murray has one giant problem. Roger Federer ... the world’s No. 1.

There’s a simple reason why Federer will win the Australian Open on Sunday.

Continue reading "Sorry Andy, but beating this guy will be a stretch" »

Following Andy Murray’s pretty convincing win in last night’s Australian Open semi-final The Punch now argues Australia must support the young Scot in the final. For one it has been 74 years since the last British male won a grand slam, and secondly Australia kind of killed their last champion.

If you are ever tempted to complain about the state of Australian tennis just remember this: the British are really, really bad. They even have to say British because as individual UK nations it would look even more pathetic.

While Virginia Wade won Wimbledon in 1977 for all the British ladies in the place, the last male Briton to win a grand slam was Fred Perry back in 1936. In 1936 the Nazis were running Germany and refrigeration was looked upon with the same awe as the iPad is today. Perhaps only bettered by Cronulla’s inability to ever win the premiership it’s one of the longest standing failures in sport.

Continue reading "Punch declares: Australia must support the skinny Scot" »

Update: Lleyton lost, again.

Excuse the disturbing imagery, but imagine for a moment Lleyton Hewitt as a burlesque dancer.

Imagine Lleyton as one of those Dita Von Teese types that have lead a popular resurgence for the art in recent years. Emerging out of a large bowl and dressed in emu feathers, Hewitt begins the Australian Open by holding an expectant crowd’s attention with his potential to nude-up with a win.

But year after year the tease is interrupted by a stern order from backstage and Lleyton goes running off, leaving the crowd to go home frustrated and merely fantasize at the potential of what we might have been treated to. 

Continue reading "Please Lleyton, put an end to this painful pants dance" »

It was strangely refreshing to hear about Brazilian Marcos Daniel apparently getting into a squabble with a female spectator after his first round loss.

Not because getting in fights with fans is particularly advisable or admirable, but it did at least give us a tennis player we could look at say “that Marcos is one bad cat”. As an average player Marcos Daniel may have done his career a favour as he is now one of the few bad guys on the circuit.

Grand Slam tennis is currently suffering under the burden of there being too many nice guys and gals on the circuit - or at the least players who have perfected the art of looking like nice guys and gals.

Continue reading "The tennis is just boring without bad guys" »

It’s Thursday @ The Punch

Tennis ace John McEnroe was defaulted out of the Australian Open on this day in 1990.

Besides the recurrence of violence among Balkan fans on the first day of the Australian Tennis Open this year being self-evidently stupid and embarrassing, it is perhaps above all really pathetic.

A really pathetic expression of half-baked nationalism from suburban mamma’s boys at the tennis.

Yes the tennis. Not a bad-ass crowd sport like European soccer matches where iron bars and pocket knives are common accoutrements among fans.

Continue reading "Ethnic violence at the tennis, it’s just so pathetic" »

There is a very serious problem with the Australian open. Her name is Maria Sharapova. And it’s not her weird grunting that’s the issue.

Take a long. Hard. Look at her.

With three grand slams already under her 22-year-old designer belt, including the US Open, Wimbledon and the Australian Open, plus a long list of other titles, the Russian certainly qualifies for being at this year’s tournament, let’s hope the injuries stay at bay. But talent isn’t the problem.

Continue reading "The one reason we should all hate Maria Sharapova" »

Losing is not something we like to talk about much at this time of year.

We’re reminded of the greatest premiership winning teams, the possibility of St. Kilda or Parramatta breaking the drought or Geelong or Melbourne Storm cementing their place as real champion teams.

But given that the team or individual that we follow is more often going to lose the premiership, not win the gold, or fail at the World Cup, our experiences with losing are arguably are more important in defining our support of the team or person than that of winning.

So in the lead up to the two biggest sporting weekends of the year The Punch writers have compiled, in no particular order, the ten teams or people that have let us down or just not performed when it mattered in Australia’s recent sporting history. What are yours?

Continue reading "Our ten biggest sporting losers" »

As Lleyton Hewitt limbers up for tonight’s showdown with Andy Roddick, The Punch has gone to the trouble of writing down the lyrics for our putative national song, so that any tennis enthusiast who’s recently been lobotomised can sing along with The Fanatics and not miss a single word.

It goes: Aussie Aussie Aussie. Oi Oi Oi. Aussie Aussie Aussie. Oi Oi Oi. Aussie. Oi. Aussie. Oi. Aussie Aussie Aussie. Oi Oi Oi.

It’s a ripper isn’t it? The result of more than two centuries’ development by a nation which inherited a rich tradition of song from the Celts, as demonstrated in the above video of the Irish crowd at Croke Park singing The Fields of Athenry.

There’s an Aussie tie-in with this stirring Irish song. It’s about a fellow who’s been jailed and sent to prison in Australia. The lyrics recount the last conversation he and his his wife will ever have, singing to each other across the prison wall before he’s put on the ship.

The story of Aussie Aussie Aussie is similarly powerful, in that it’s about an Aussie Aussie who Oi Oi Aussie Oi, Aussie Oi. I mean seriously - just how dumb are we as a nation? Or rather, how dumb do we like to pretend to be?

Continue reading "Are you a brain-dead Aussie Aussie Aussie?" »